CAREER SUPPORT SERVICES
We have to work to live. And, in our society, we generally have to work a lot to keep our jobs. That means the time we spend at work will probably be the majority of the time we are on this planet.
Let me help you flourish at work - you can improve both your quality of life and the work you do by being your fullest and most aligned self in the workplace.
I can help you work through fear of failure, writer's block and stagnation, work transitions, fear of success, and all manner of workplace relationships (bosses, partners, employees, colleagues, etc.).
Read more below on each of these areas and to see specific workplace circumstances where I might offer particularly helpful insights from my own experience above and beyond my coaching and advocate skillsets.
Most individuals usually benefit most from coaching, advocacy, and guidance for career support. This is your career - you will be the subject matter expert on what you do and the relationships you have at work. Most likely, my role will be to help you find clarity about your goals, integrate what you're doing on a daily basis with those goals, and to create an effective action plan for implementing that integration.
In other instances, you may need my support as an advocate. For example, for LGBTQ, especially trans and non-binary individuals, sometimes your workplace needs to hear from someone else. In this role, I can help to educate others. It is not healthy for you to take on educating your workplace. I have extensive experience speaking to workplaces, institutions, and other entities about how to treat members of the LGBTQ community. I have also helped employers catch up with making spaces more LGBTQ inclusive by crafting policies, such as for employee transition. If needed, I have a large number of fellow lawyers and advocates to call on to support you in your workplace.
In certain circumstances, where I have been there myself (fellow lawyers, other navigating professional office politics, or coming out in the work place) and have specific lived-experience expertise, I will be able to serve as an advisor. Rarely, I can offer specific education to you about your own workplace and work relationships.
It may surprise you to find out that, sometimes, spiritual guidance can be instrumental in relating better to your work and workplace. This is particularly true where you might be in your own way.
CREATIVE SOLUTIONS
I have over a decade of experience coming up with creative solutions to intractable problems. High level lawyering is really nothing more than professional problem solving.
As a "Big Law" attorney I spent more than a decade helping business people and government leaders find value added solutions to disputes and value driven methods of managing risks. I have done so across a wide number of industries.
I am a superlative thinking partner with a breath of knowledge, a passion for learning and listening, and an ability to help you stick to your core questions. I can help you think through any business issue and help find the solution path to any problem you face.
PRIORITIES, ORDERING TASKS, AND COMPLETING COMPLEX PROJECTS
Sometimes work challenges can be as simple as identifying what has the highest priority, who should be doing what, and in what order should certain matters be handled.
Simple, of course, is not the same concept as easy. Scuba diving safely almost always means implementing a relatively simple protocol. This can keep divers safe even in some of the most demanding environments, like penetration diving of a wreck that lies 100 feet below the surface. That does not mean it is easy to do under all that pressure (pun intended).
A lot of work problems are like that too. In diving, we try to always have a buddy - they can often have the additional resources we need or the lack of stress to see a simple solution to something that might have us befuddled. I can be your work dive buddy - we can figure out the protocol and I can help you implement it because I am not under the stress you are under.
FEAR OF FAILURE
Sometimes, however, we are stymied by more than just the stress of the situation. Sometimes we get in our own way. Sometimes we worry that the path we are on is a dead end - or worse.
These fears are healthy and useful - so long as they are informing but not guiding our decisions. Often these fears are conscious - but their impact may not be fully conscious. Just as often, however, we have learned to push these fears down below the surface, in an attempt to overcome them or show ourselves a brave face, rather than listening them. They will just get louder as they try desperately to warn us, raising their voices explicitly because they're now also worried that their message will not be received in time.
It can be very helpful sit with another person to process and integrate these fears into a useful place in our decision making. I can facilitate that dialogue between these disparate parts of yourself, whether they are all mental or partially somatic or even spiritual.
STAGNATION
Work almost always involves some compromise between what we would like to do be doing and what we need to do in order to earn income. This is a fact of life; it is especially a fact of life in the current U.S. workplace.
We, however, cannot live with all compromises that we are asked to make. Sometimes we cannot live with the number of compromises; other times, certain compromises are qualitatively problematic.
When we compromise too much we get frustrated with ourselves, with our workplace, with our life. Frustration leads to stagnation.
We can unravel that history, uncover the compromises that were too much, and re-discover (or discover for the first time) the way to connect authentically and be your full self in the work you are doing.
More importantly, we can find a way to have that work make sense and meaning in the world and with those values and goals you hold for your world and community.
FEAR OF SUCCESS
What if I succeed? What if I get this role? What if I have to speak to colleagues that I admire? What if I have to introduce a Congressperson?
Sometimes we do not want to be seen or to succeed. Sometimes we feel do not deserve to succeed. Sometimes we feel like an imposter. If you're me, maybe that feeling never goes away.
Again, it is important to acknowledge these feelings, these anxieties, these fears, these feelings of shame, and the attend frustrations that you might be worried about in that hypothetical future.
The only real cure for a fear of success is clarity and alignment. Clarity as to its root cause and clarity as to your goals. Once you have true clarity as to your personal circumstances, you can align yourself with your values and stand worthy before your inner critic. Once you have true clarity as to your goals, you can align you conduct with those goals and feel like you have appropriately earned the outcome you reap.
WORK PLACE TRANSITIONS
Sometimes you need a change.
Changes, especially significant changes, often require both significant planning and significant internal emotional labor.
I can help you work through both,
PARTICULAR LIVED EXPERIENCES AND EXPERTISE:
I can be especially helpful and, where appropriate and desired, offer advice in each of the following areas:
Navigating workplace politics for professionals;
Completing large, complicated projects in the workplace;
Completing degrees in higher education;
Coming out at work - including changing workplace culture and helping workplaces develop appropriate policies;
Navigating intersectional identity in the workplace;
Integrating your values into your work.
Support for a Flourishing Life. Advice, guidance, education, and coaching for shaping your career and personal life to match your values and meet your goals.
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